10 Tips for Blogging by Public Sector Executives
Tip 1: Define yourself and your purpose.
Tip 2: Do it yourself!
Tip 3: Make a time commitment.
Tip 4: Be regular.
Tip 5: Be generous.
Tip 6: Have a “hard hide.”
Tip 7: Spell-check.
Tip 8: Don’t give too much information.
Tip 9: Consider multimedia.
Tip 10: Be a student of blogging.

This report is a must-read for all current and would-be government bloggers.

Why would you bother?

There are several reasons:

• because it is a low-cost channel for connecting to potential and current clients.
• because being an early adopter in this channel is a remarkable thing in and of itself.
• because Linden Labs, owners of Second Life, want to help make it happen.

For more background on why large organisations (including government) are looking to Second Life, please see:

• CDCs Second Life
• First UK law firm opens ‘virtual’ office
• First virtual consultancy in Second Life
• Second Life: Making it work for business
• Maldives pips Sweden in the “first Second Life embassy” race
• IBM gives birth to Second Life business group

And it should be noted that not every organisation is suited to Second Life. Some disqualifiers include:

• no potential client base on Second Life: while this does not apply to most organisations, there are some (such as local government or intelligence) that might be better served by alternative means.
• low organisational will: if you do not have an organisational website, chances are that your corporate culture does not support early adoption, and it may be a difficult thing to manage a Second Life implementation.

So what is involved?

Costs can be broken down into:

• Land: this can be the “big-splash - let’s buy our own island” model - this is USD1,675.00 plus USD295.00 a month. A 16-acre virtual territory on the “mainland” is around USD4,000.00 for a good location plus USD295.00 a month in maintenance. You can set up a presence in someone else’ building for a lot less. How notable a presence do you need? For more information see Real estate: buying and selling land in Second Life
• Setup costs: It is possible to spend a lot of money setting up a government office in Second Life - costs in the low nine figures are bandied about for the likes of setting up the virtual corporate HQ for Dell and IBM. That said, there is a lot of help in-world for those interested in learning to build, as well as plenty of people that will create custom designs for you (for a fee - like every other builder, you should ask for references and examples of their work). For an illustration of how easy it is to get started and create simple structures, read Mitch Wagner’s article on Building in Second Life. You can get your corporate IT providers to create the whole thing for you, or utilise in-world experts.
• Maintenance costs: Apart from the USD295 a month that owners of islands and 16 acre quadrants pay to Linden Labs, what costs are there for maintenance? At a minimum, none - unless you want to add more functionality (i.e. a bigger virtual shopfront, more online information, and more staff members).
• Staffing costs: Depending on how you staff your virtual shopfront, this is probably the biggest single cost to the organisation. Do you have volunteers that can be rostered on at opportunity-cost only for eight plus hours a day? Most organisations do not. In-world labour varies (as in real life) in quality and cost - you can hire virtual receptionists with reasonable language skills from a few (USD) dollars an hour and up, or have the best client service/sales/marketing minds in your organisation. Help desk operations are probably a good comparison - first-level operators help with the simplest enquiries and ensure that calls are logged and escalated as required. Fourth-level support pulls the system to pieces and rebuilds it - with all the graduations of specialisation (and cost) in between.

The early adopters are making hay while the sun shines in Second Life - the fad, if it is one, does not look like failing soon. Do it properly by all means, but think about doing it soon.

[1] calculated at an island “purchase” cost of USD1,675 plus USD295 a month thereafter.

To find out if there is a solid business case, you need to write some kind of plan.

Do you need to undertake an audience needs analysis?

The simple answer is this: Yes! You need to be able to defend your position - whether it be within your own organisation, or at Senate Estimates, or to your web-publishing peers in industry - and you can either be reactive (wait until you’re asked and then think about it) or proactive (undertake an audience needs analysis as soon as possible for an existing project, or as early as possible in a new project). Guess which way is more efficient?

How do you undertake an audience needs analysis?

There are many ways of undertaking an audience needs analysis - the simplest is to find some representative audience members (AKA “users”, although this term is becoming less fashionable in the last couple of years) and talk to them. Funds and time allowing, you can also go the whole hog and engage a market research firm (one such that I am happy to recommend is Inside Story).

Some points to consider:

• Please accept that you may not know the full depth of your potential audience until you’ve launched your project. That said, you will easily find some audience members, and they will be able to refer you to others.
• There is no one right way to perform audience needs analysis - some ways are more efficient than others.
• If you are honest and transparent in what you offer audience interviewees they will be more forthcoming. Say what you have in mind, and accept all comments.
• Analyse comments for “doability” and congruence with project and organisational policy aims.
• Be honest with your own feelings throughout the process - it is normal to feel defensive when someone is attacking a concept that you have an emotional investment in, and understand that acceptance of any idea has no correlation to its worth (that said, acceptance makes the process easier).
• Record audience member comments and suggestions - follow up on specific requests for further information where you have undertaken to provide them, and keep in mind that everyone likes validation of their ideas by seeing them recorded and referenced.

Once you understand who you are putting the project together for, you can work out how best to undertake it - there are often small ways to include the needs of a diverse range of audiences such that all feel included in the process. More on that in a later posting.

I’d like to reiterate that this is a directory of government blogs, not blogs on government.

Thanks, Andrew

What this means is that until the DNS change propagates around the world, this blog will appear to be off the air. All going well this will only be a day or two - at the most.

Thanks for reading - it is because of your interest that this move is possible.

To find out if there is a solid business case, you need to write some kind of plan. There are a dozen ways or more to put a project proposal together, but they generally contain:

• an executive summary,
• a high level concept description,
• some kind of audience needs analysis,
• issues/risks and likely mitigation strategies, and
• indicative costings/timings.

Note: They do not have to be in this format or this order.

Over the next couple of weeks I’ll put out articles addressing each of these points, based on what I have seen work to date in 20 years plus in and around government.

• who owns the information?
• who owns the information dissemination process?
• who is responsible for any issues arising from distributing the information?

Chances are that there are clear cut answers within your organisation for question number 2: you probably have a corporate communications/public affairs/corporate web area that sees themselves as having ownership of the dissemination process. In plain language, any outward-facing content has to be in a form that they are happy with. Perhaps they control the process directly.

If you are not in this area, and are seeking a way to work with rather than against various stakeholders, rest assured that there are resources available.

One of my favourites is a book called Cubicle Commando - and I am happy to recommend it in accordance with my advertising and affiliation policy (in other words, if you buy it, I will not make a cent off the sale). Cubicle Commando is about being an intrapreneur - someone who wants to make a difference in their organisation. Chances are, if you are reading this post, you are an intrapreneur. Cubicle Commando has tips and tricks for engendering change within large organisations - one of my favourite parts is “Sleeping with the enemy” that talks about working positively with people who have negative perceptions of your work. It applies itself beautifully to the needs of the would-be corporate blogger, and doubly so to those of us who work in and around government. It is one of those books that is both inspiring and powerful. One of the authors, Zern Liew, has his own blog over at eicolab, and the other, Lisa Messenger, is working on getting one going.

If you have a “dealing with difficult people” success story that you’d like to share, please leave a comment.

An article on Gary Nairn’s speech on Wednesday 02 May mentioned:

Blogs could be the next frontier for governments to discuss plans and policies with citizens, according to special minister of state Gary Nairn.

Nairn told the CeBIT conference in Sydney this morning that blogs could represent a “new era” in community interaction as the government develops more online services.

“Blogs could split up consultation and enable government and others to analyse and debate issues in reasonable detail,” he said.

“This could then lead to more informed policy and program development.”

This could not just be the government talking to its citizens, but also citizens talking amongst themselves about policy issues, according to Nairn.

“Blogging could lead to a new era of community interaction.

“For example, Australians in the city might learn more about life in the bush from people that live there.”

Localised blogs and other online technologies could help bridge the rural-city communication divide in Australia, according to Nairn.

Nairn discussed the blogs in a roundup of the “significant progress” of the e-government strategy, which he launched at the same event 12 months ago.

I was privileged to be present at CeBIT Australia 2007’s eGovernment conference to witness this historic speech. This is what BlogDotGov is about: discussing government blogs and the issues around government blogging.